Yacht Club Says Membership List Shows It Doesn't Discriminate

TALLAHASSEE — An exclusive Palm Beach yacht club Tuesday released its membership list in a first-of-its-kind attempt to convince the state that Jews, single women and Hispanics can belong.

The private Sailfish Club already had acknowledged having no blacks as members.

Faced with losing their state lease for docks if they did not show evidence of nondiscrimination, club officials also presented their new membership application form. It no longer asks for church affiliation or the wife's maiden name, presumably a clue to ethnic background.

The club ''respectfully suggests that appropriate steps have been taken,'' said attorney Richard Brightman in a letter Tuesday to Attorney General Bob Butterworth.

For the yacht club world, a bastion of exclusivity, it was a sign that the pressure to be politically correct can no longer be kept at bay - at least in Florida.

Forty-one yacht clubs in the state besides the Sailfish Club have nondiscriminatory clauses in their leases and could face similar scrutiny. Included are the Eau Gallie Yacht Club, Bella Vista Real Estate Company at Howey-in-the-Hills, Isleworth Partners in Windermere and Smyrna Yacht Club in New Smyrna Beach.

In 1998, another 54 yacht clubs, whose old leases had been grandfathered in, probably will be forced to include the same nondiscriminatory clause. They include the Lake Beresford Yacht Club in DeLand, the Halifax River Yacht Club in Daytona Beach and one owned by the city of Titusville.

Since 1987, the state has required yacht clubs leasing state lands to promise in their lease not to exclude members based on ''race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, handicap or marital status.''

Previously, the wall of privilege around these clubs had been impossible for some to breach. Three years ago, Palm Beach accountant Richard Rampell was told by a club member that his long-standing application with the Sailfish Club would never be accepted because he is a Jew.

The Sailfish Club became the initial test case because of public complaints about discrimination there.